December 14, 2005

Final Keynote at Syndicate

Here's why I love listening to Doc's talks....his slides are full of humorous analogies for Web 2.0 trends and tools. In comic style font, he displays - "The Live Web Isn't a Fork, It's More of a Branch. It's still the same tree, and growing from the same trunk. Think of the Live Web as one big Declaration of Independence."

Says Doc - "The web is all human voice, all live voice -- all the time. Independence and liberty and autonomy is what the live web is about and its personal now. We're taking these virtues and practicing them as individuals."

He talks about industrial or more traditional publishing versus blogging and what it has created, how they're different and why its important not just in the publishing industry but for everyone. News and insights that came out of the election is a constant reminder of that.

Industrial publishers produce finished works - its a good thing, but its not the only thing. We (bloggers) create provisional works - that's what makes it alive. It's works in progress. Think of blogging and syndication as rolling snowballs.

On the live Web, production matters more than consumption. In the old consumer marketplace, we're always looking to the big players, like the big record companies, Kodak, Sony, etc - its all about production. On the live web - its not just consuming, its about producing and its about reproducing.

It's more about finding other producers to work with first than it is about finding consumers.

"Everyone gets to be a star in the new world," says Doc, who we learn is a Leo. I could have guessed that - always get along with Leos.

The Static Web is a haystack and disorganized. In the Live Web, you can organize things - from the ground up or from the 'stars out.' Blogs are organized and is chronological - posts are dated, categorized (thanks to tags) and authored.......content about authors at a particular period of time. It's human, even if its a corporate blog.

The Live Web is an ecosystem of participaton. Participation matters. Says Doc, "If you're not participating, its like you're not alive...."

We turn corners and start to talk about business models. Advertising needs to mature to something that is truly helpful (100% click throughs).....

Doc talks about markets......he indicates in one of his slides - "Markets are made two ways....The Live Web makes necessities that mother inventions that mother necessities."

What about meta? What about i-tags and what they look like? What about XRI? He gets technical and jokes about something that I've been thinking the entire conference. This conference is full of techies and geeks. I'm thinking the industry talking to the industry. (with a few others scattered about)....

And on the meta point. He says, "we need to save and spread the Live Open Spaces." There's a war going on between two different concepts on the Net. Here's the question, he asks us:

"Is the Net just pipes through which production passes through? Or is it a wide open space where free markets and free culture can thrive in too many ways to imagine?

Most think its still the former, but Web 2.0 is changing that. He adds that "We have to get as smart about politics as we are about technology and business.

It's about freedom vs slavery. We have slavery to phone and cable guys. It's about dependence vs independence. It's about open versus closed.